


Colored In Lines

by KaiserinAstraia



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Universe, Cross The Line Fic, First Kiss, Getting Together, M/M, Soulmark AU, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-22
Updated: 2019-11-22
Packaged: 2021-02-18 04:42:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,836
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21505378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KaiserinAstraia/pseuds/KaiserinAstraia
Summary: Riku defined the corners and edges of their relationship, whether it was the start and end to a race down the beach, or the borders of their cave wall drawings, or right and left,  winning and losing. Light and dark. Riku always pushed Sora in the opposite direction — and that stupid wooden sword was no different. If Riku was Chosen, then Sora was Unchosen, and the sword was a line in the sand that he shouldn’t cross.Sora had never been good at staying in the lines.
Relationships: Riku/Sora (Kingdom Hearts)
Comments: 16
Kudos: 140
Collections: Cross the Line: a soriku zine





	Colored In Lines

**Author's Note:**

> Hi all!
> 
> It's been a long time coming, but I finally get to share my fic from the Cross the Line zine with you all! The zine was my baby, so thank you for reading and for those who bought the zine, thank you again! There are **so** many good fics in the collection, so please check out the others as well!

Sora thought he was prepared, but his knees were jelly, his eyesight blurry, and his heart hammered in his ribs like a panicked, caged bird. The dusty air around him, pouring out from the loud, dirty, and busted pipes of Hollow Bastion, was swift and elusive, as if it rejected him, as if it wanted to see Sora fall just as much as his opponent did. As if it _hated_ him, as much Riku did. His best friend, his—

The room around him seemed to tilt and distort with the effort he flung his thoughts away from the word, and the onslaught of Riku’s — no, _Ansem’s,_ attacks. His limbs moved on pure instinct and desperation, each attack another scream of _why, why, why?_

His words _“Go play hero with this,”_ and the _plunk_ of the wooden sword thrown on stone echoed in reply, repeating like a broken record in his mind. Though his eyes should have stayed on Riku’s dark Keyblade, they kept searching for his sharp, narrowed aquamarine eyes for _something,_ some _hint_ that Riku was there. Sora couldn’t think straight enough to tell, could only weigh whether the splinters of the wooden sword hurt more than his crazed stare.

It wasn’t Riku, but it’d always been this way. Riku defined the corners and edges of their relationship, whether it was the start and end to a race down the beach, or the borders of their cave wall drawings, or right and left, winning and losing. Light and dark. Riku always pushed Sora in the opposite direction — and that _stupid_ wooden sword was no different. If Riku was Chosen, then Sora was Unchosen, and the sword was a line in the sand that he shouldn’t cross.

Sora had never been good at staying in the lines.

Sora knew Riku was stronger than him, though the gap had been shortened in their time apart. He could tell in the force Riku — no, Ansem — put forth in every jab with his black blade that this was no longer a spar for fun. Thus far, Sora had only taken a few hits and given a few of his own, but his whole body was hot and burning like it’d been hours.

As soon as Riku caught an opening, he lunged forward with a side-slash. It caught Sora’s wrist and split his glove, the cloth hanging off his fingers. Gasping, Sora dropped his Keyblade as his hand spasmed, the pain traveling up and down his arm and settling at his already aching wrist. Riku mercilessly lifted his blade again, winding back to strike down.

Sora blocked in a flurry of light, Keyblade materializing in one hand with the crown tip in his other palm.

Sora grit his teeth in the effort it took to halt the descent of Riku’s Keyblade, and pushed like he could bring Riku back on willpower alone. The metal against metal made a screech that made his bones squirm, but Riku was unfazed. He looked to the crossroads of their blades and followed it down to Sora’s hilt, where Sora gripped so hard his knuckles were white.

Riku’s expression froze. He had become more and more pale every time Sora saw him, but he turned sheet-white, stare unwavering at Sora’s wrist. Sora followed his line of sight, and then felt his heart fall straight through the floor.

There, on the underside of his wrist, was his Mark. The scribbled, uneven paopu-shaped outline was as fresh as the night before the raft, despite the raw, angry pink skin inside and around it.

Riku leapt away, and Sora let his Keyblade dematerialize. He suddenly felt naked and vulnerable under Riku’s shocked gaze — and it _was_ Riku now, the color of his eyes filled in like his soul had been poured back in. Before Sora could say anything, Riku shouted, raspy and struggling, “The paopu — you still draw it?”

Sora lifted his wrist and looked at it, confused. Didn’t Riku know? “No!” Sora shouted back; he sounded like he’d been crying, like another word would break him down— but in desperation Sora found he couldn’t stop and didn’t care. “No, it— it won’t come off!”

“Won’t… come off?” Riku said, voice stronger but breaking. Gingerly, so gently it twisted Sora’s stomach, Riku brought his own wrist up, but it was covered by his dark blue and red full-bodied suit. It didn’t matter; they both knew what they would find if he took it off. The hard edges of anger softened off Riku’s features, staring in awe at it. Relief brought some color back to his skin.

Something cruel and hurt within Sora begged him to hurl, “ _what do you care?_ ” but the spark of flame extinguished instantly when Riku’s expression shattered, so distinct that Sora would swear he heard glass breaking behind his eyes. Riku’s hands curled into fists as he snarled, “You _tried?_ ”

Sora’s blood turned to ice under his gaze; it was beyond angry, beyond hurt — beyond broken.

He couldn’t continue to look. Glaring at the ground, tears sprung to prick and spill over his eyes. He couldn’t get past the lump in his throat though he _wanted_ to. _This_ was what Riku _wanted_ , wasn’t it? After what Riku had done to Pinocchio, after his cruel words in Neverland and _here_ , ( _”We’ve always been_ ** _rivals_** _, haven’t we?”_ spun and twisted around his chest, eating away paths wherever it went—) what was Sora _supposed_ to think? Rivals weren’t _soulmates_ ; soulmates weren’t enemies. It wasn’t _Sora’s_ fault the Mark had become permanent.

He couldn’t say any of it, though his fingernails dug so deeply into his palm it pierced the skin and his body said the rest, the way he shook. Riku broke into terrible laughter — loud, barking, and hollower than Sora ever felt. Sora looked up, eyes widening in horror; Riku was gone again. The other entity was in control. Despite himself, Sora asked, no, _begged_ , “Riku…?”

“Your soulmate is gone,” Not-Riku said, callously and knowing. The Keyblade of Heart materialized again, and he raised it straight toward Sora’s chest, where the shards of his heart lay in a pile.

* 

The path between the elementary school and Sora’s house was a short stretch, but in the stifling August heat, it was long for Riku’s short legs, and difficult when Riku kept _checking, checking, checking_ every patch of exposed skin — checking that he didn’t have _it_.

He found Sora at the living room coffee table, three crayons in his hand as he colored on an otherwise blank printer paper. The swift slam of his front door made Sora look up in alarm, but he immediately broke into an excited smile when he saw the trespasser. “Riku!” he said, the hours of being without his friend evident in his tone. But, one look at Riku’s face caused his smile to drop. “Riku, what’s wrong? Was school bad?”

Riku didn’t answer. He didn’t straighten out his uniform, or take off his shoes or his backpack until he joined Sora’s side on the carpet. “I need to check you,” Riku said, tone grave.

Sora tilted his head. “Check? What for?” he asked, though he gave no resistance as Riku grabbed his arm and inspected it, under and over.

Riku had been thinking about what his teacher had taught all day, had waited _hours_ to rush to Sora’s and assuage the new terror that welled within him. Riku grabbed Sora’s other arm, but Sora squirmed this time and Riku paused.

“You know how your mom has a daisy on her shoulder?” Riku finally asked, staring up into Sora’s honest, unassuming eyes. He wondered if Sora already knew. If he knew, wouldn’t he tell his best friend? They told each other _everything_ , right?

“Mmm, yeah,” Sora said, his checked arms falling to his lap simply. His eyes never left Riku’s, completely attentive; it wasn’t the first time Riku had come home from school with an earth-shattering revelation, but this was the first he looked so upset.

Riku exhaled a sigh of relief; thank goodness, _he_ got to tell Sora. “It’s her Soulmark,” Riku said, frank but solemn.

“Soul… mark?” Sora asked, testing the phrase on his tongue. He rubbed the back of his hand under his chin, leaving a fresh streak of purple marker from his clumsy marked hands. “What’s that?”

The words were out of Riku mouth faster than either of them could blink. “It’s a mark that you and one other person have, and it means you’re meant to be together.” Sora blinked, and Riku added, “ _forever_.”

Sora’s eyes widened, his blue irises sparkling. “Like, the paopu story?”

Sora knew that one from Riku, as well, how two princes once shared the fruit to intertwine their destinies. Riku nodded. “Like that, except these ones just, _show up_ eventually.” He frowned — _they’d appear, no matter if you already…_

Sora audibly gasped, and unceremoniously dropped his crayon before grabbing Riku’s hands. “When?” He checked his own shoulders one side at a time, spying for a Mark.

Riku paled. Tidus already _had_ his _._ At recess, he proudly rolled up his sleeve to reveal _his_ Mark. An ‘early bloomer’, he said. He boasted about how when he met his soulmate someday, he’d never leave their side, that they would be together forever, best friends, and oh-so- _romantic_. Riku scowled.

“Hopefully never,” he said.

Sora tilted his head in confusion again, pausing from checking his crossed legs for a special picture. “Never?”

Sora’s pout made Riku mad, and watching him so hopefully and eagerly spying his skin for a Mark pushed Riku past the brink. “Sora, if you get a Soulmark with someone else, we won’t play together anymore!” Riku started, practically shouting. Sora’s smile disappeared, but Riku couldn’t stop. “You’ll want to be with _them_ all the time and you’ll—” _You’ll stop caring about_ ** _me._** He fell silent, but looked at his lap, fighting back tears. “We won’t get be to best friends anymore.”

Sora didn’t say anything as Riku tried pull back the feelings too big for him to understand or contain — he wanted to be _mad_ not _sad_. Using the back of his hand to wipe the sides of his eyes, he felt his cheeks warm thinking that he was _crying_ over something so silly. Sora wouldn’t _really_ stop being his best friend, right? All just because of some picture? He tried to sniffle as quietly as possible, but luckily for him, Sora spoke over it.

“Well…” Riku could see in his mind’s eye that Sora was scratching his cheek, “why don’t we make our own?” he said, voice bright and excited — like it made all the sense in the world. Riku looked up in shock, which served as all the encouragement Sora needed. He proudly scooped up his markers and showed them to Riku with a wide grin.

Riku sputtered. “B-but… it, it doesn’t work that way.” His teacher hadn’t said anything like that; the Marks would appear on their own. It was final — permanent. “Besides, those are machine washable,” he grumbled. He pointed to the box that had the phrase in big, white letters as evidence.

“So?” Sora said, unphased. “We’ll draw it again after it washes off!” Sora looked hopefully between the markers and Riku, eyes glittering like he could rearrange the stars just because he felt like it.

And maybe he could. Riku _wanted_ to believe it, because if _Sora_ was his soulmate, pretend or not, it wouldn’t be so bad. What did his teacher know, anyway? Maybe if he just wished hard enough, it would come true. It wasn't too difficult, with Sora’s blinding smile.

“What… what do you want to draw?” Riku asked finally, looking shyly at their full array of color choices.

Sora beamed. “Something pretty! Like my mom’s—” he swirled to his paper, quickly sketching a little dandelion. It looked more like a balloon. “Or something cool, like a sword!”

Riku tilted his head, his scrutinizing eye watching as Sora drew. A sword be OK. They didn't have the drawing skills to make it look cool, though. Emboldened, he slid the paper closer to him so fast that Sora’s crayon almost got on the wood of the table. “No, I got a better idea.” He snatched a yellow crayon, and a green one. Stars were easy to draw. Sora watched Riku draw eagerly from his side — when Riku glanced over, their eyes met and they smiled.

“What about this?” Riku grinned at his work, knowing Sora would love it. A paopu was perfect for them, and maybe it was close enough to the fairy tale to override the stupid Soulmark thing.

“Yeah!” Sora agreed, nodding ecstatically. He stuck out his wrist eagerly, and said, “I dunno how to draw it, though.”

Riku plucked the black marker. “I’ll show you,” he said, confident. Riku crossed five lines on Sora’s wrist, slowly. Up, down, left, (”That _tickles_!” Sora giggled, squirming and squiggling Riku’s work,) right, left. “Like that.” And then, he added two leaves to the top tip. Riku smirked at it, satisfied that it was nearly even.

Sora smiled at it, too, singing its praises while turning his wrist in all angles he could. While Sora was distracted, Riku carefully drew one on his wrist, too — he was better at this sort of thing, anyway.

He’d barely gotten the ink to dry before Sora cried, “Lemme color it!” He grabbed two markers — yellow and green — from the table with haste, and Riku outstretched his arm, hiding his smile.

“You better not mess it up, or it'll look dumb,” Riku warned, but it had no bite.

Sora aggressively swiped the colors across Riku’s skin, filling in the shape but also smearing some around the edges. The colors smudged together a little. “There!” Sora exclaimed proudly, before coloring in his own paopu.

Riku gazed at his star-gone-fruit, and despite the messy colors, felt something solid and heavy in his chest melt into something warm and soft. Maybe it wasn't a _real_ Mark, but it could be real to them. They were great at make-believe, after all.

“Don’t forget to re-draw it,” Riku reiterated, heart beating a little faster, “promise?”

Sora grinned again, and held out a pinky to lock. “You, too, Riku! It’s a promise!”

Riku hooked his pinky with Sora’s without a second thought.

* 

Sora dared to peek at Riku from the side, as if his blank face held the answer to how Sora could fill the silence between them with more than the calm waves lapping the shore in front of them. The colorless moonlight seemed to drain all the hues around them — from the sky, the water, and the rocks to a shade of gray, except for Riku. His hair shimmered like sparkling star-shine, and his pensive eyes glistened like the surface of the aquamarine ocean on Destiny Islands. The longer Sora stared, the more the murky, dark waves sounded like home.

Sora had spent every waking moment of the past year searching and chasing after Riku like he could grab onto the promise they broke like a string and never let go again. How many times had he felt it slip through his fingers, as if Riku had been there?And now that they were finally reunited, Sora felt like they were still dancing around the same borders Sora worked so hard to work around.

Sora opened his mouth, a million lines burgeoning at the back of his throat, but nothing came out. Still, it caught Riku’s attention, and their eyes met for one fluttering moment before Riku let his eyes drop to the black sand between them, where Sora’s fingers dug in restlessness.

Riku’s eyes widened, breath hitching faintly. Sora felt it before he saw it, too. An electric shock shot through his wrist up to his lips, settling in a blush across his cheeks and a lingering tingling sensation on his Soulmark. It was there, despite everything, and it manifested exactly like the original one Riku had drawn years ago, in spite of the countless times Sora had traced and redrawn it. Sora’s own gaze fell to where he knew Riku’s would be, but it was hidden under a long, white compression band. Sora hadn’t noticed it before, nor knew what he wore it _for_. Was he hiding his Mark?

“I didn’t think… it would stay,” Riku admitted.

Sora blinked, and then shifted his weight to lift his wrist, to inspect what he knew was already there.

Sora felt like the Door to Kingdom Hearts was closing all over again, at the boundary between light and dark where they were forced on opposite sides. He felt the same urgency in those last moments he saw Riku’s face through the sliver of space in between the doors — when Riku had held up his wrist and said, “You can make your own,” with the soft smile and tone of a string fraying slowly and then snapping at the last strand. He was stolen the opportunity to respond then, but he finally would now.

Swallowing apprehension but resolved, Sora replied, “If it hadn’t, I would’ve redrawn it.”

By the time he gathered the courage to look up again, his cheeks were warm; it was jarring against the chilled air. 

Riku’s eyes were as wide as saucers. “Wh-what?” His voice broke.

“It… it was our promise,” Sora pressed, “that even if we got other Marks, we would keep ours.” A heavy weight settled in his chest as he said the words, a terrible night flashing through his mind: of crying and scrubbing his arm pink at the fountain of Hollow Bastion, distressed yet overjoyed that the paopu on his arm wouldn’t come off.

Similarly, Riku’s eyes darkened. With hands clenched in the sand, Riku ground out, “But I—” He struggled for a moment, jaw clenching and unclenching as he warred with himself, “I hurt you. I didn’t want you to feel… obligated to keep it.”

Sora glared _fire_ at the intensity he disagreed, but Riku kept going, eyes still glued to the messy sand where Sora’s hand used to be. “Being your soulmate— I don’t deserve it.”

A knot of too many unnamed feelings filled Sora’s throat, and he couldn’t contain it any longer. He laid his hand on top of Riku’s and squeezed, beseeching. “Riku, it was never _about_ deserving.”

Riku twitched, nearly yanking his hand away, but Sora squeezed harder. “Normal soulmates just _happen_ , right? _They_ never caredabout deserving or not, so why would we?” Watching Riku’s brows flit together, Sora added, firmly, “ _I_ don’t care.”

That was enough to cause Riku to pause. “Sora…”

“Listen, I… this whole year, even though you were pushing me away, I knew you were there, leaving me hints and helping me, too.” Riku scoffed quietly, but looked away — his cheeks were a little pink. Encouraged, Sora continued, “You’re always doing this, going off on your own and making the decisions, but you never asked mewhat _I_ had decided.”

Riku was speechless, his eyes wide and searching like he dare not even _breathe_ before assuming Sora’s message.

“I pick you,” Sora said, breathless and hurried. The tightness in his heart finally unfurled, and he felt lighter. “Deserving or not, soulmates or not.”

Riku froze in place, eyes blown wide in disbelief, but his hand, still clenched under Sora’s, unfolded slowly. Unable to help himself, Sora slipped his fingers between Riku’s, an intertwined mess in the sand. “It…” Riku spoke and the hard edges of his face softened, his lips on the brink of a smile, “doesn’t work that way.” He looked up to the sky, eyes seeing another time while Sora heard it in his heart, where it settled and ballooned in remembrance.

“So?” Sora teased back, gently.

Sora hadn’t realized he’d drawn so close until Riku turned his head back to him, and Sora could only see Riku’s eyes, all turquoise filled with deep teal spokes of a compass, pointing in every direction under the sun. Sora felt like he belonged there, following wherever Riku’s lines pointed, hopping back and forth wherever he pleased.

Riku finally smiled, a crooked but happy thing. “So,” he agreed. A buzz hung in the air like electricity, and Sora knew the feeling well — of Riku waiting to see what Sora would do.

Sora didn’t make Riku wait a second longer. With a gentle tug of Riku’s vest, he pulled Riku forward while Sora leaned in until their lips met and filled the space between them with a kiss. It was clumsy, hardly more than a bump of faces, and unexpected for both parties, but was _right_ in a way that Sora could only describe as _light_ and color. Riku’s lips were surprisingly soft, but resolute and grounding. Sora felt warmth spread from his toes to his lips, felt it swell in his chest like a flower in bloom, and deposit into a searing heat in his wrist.

It reached a fever pitch that Sora almost couldn’t stand and he pulled away, eyes fluttering and alight as they darted to his wrist. There, a blinding light beamed like a piece of the sun had embedded in his skin.

“Huh—?” Sora squinted and twitched away, unable to see through the shine, but then spied Riku’s wrist where the light peeked in rays out the sides of his armband and through the seams. Riku followed his gaze, and as soon as he saw it, he ripped the garment off, wincing as the whole area around glowed and glinted sharply.

The light dimmed slowly, but Sora gasped when he could finally see it’s effect. “Riku—!” Sora aligned his Mark next to Riku’s, eyes flitting between the two as they transformed. The warm glow was filling their paopu drawings with color, like the rush of waves on the shore; the black gave way in a linear sweep to a deep orange, the leaves bleeding inwardly to a vibrant shamrock, and the fruit bloomed to a sun-kissed yellow until it sealed their childish scribbles to completion.

“Woah,” Sora breathed, looking back to his soulmate.

Riku was still staring, mouth agape and the edges of his eyes shining from more than just the magic. “Yeah,” Riku said, swallowing thickly. He looked again, his thumb padding the center of the paopu gingerly. “It looks like your markers,” he said.

Riku’s eyes slowly lifted from his wrist to Sora’s eyes, an unfettered smile across his lips. Riku didn’t have to say a word for Sora to already know: Sora always filled in every chasm and void between them, took Riku’s lines and filled the spaces between. Sora saw new lines now, in the way Riku looked like some of the Mark-light had lingered on his skin and how the quirk of his smile laid out every desire he had like it was written on Sora’s hummingbird heart.

Sora smiled back, feeling so weightless he could float away. When Sora leaned in again, Riku met half-way, both grinning into the kiss.

Sora had always been better at coloring in the lines.

**Author's Note:**

> Be my friend? :) Twitter is KaiserinAstraia!


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